Some of the world's top automotive executives met recently to discuss engines of the future. Daniel Attwoodmet two of the most influential
Daniel Hancock, vice-president of GM's powertrain global engineering division, and Lewis Booth, executive vice-president of the Ford Motor Company, chairman of Ford of Europe and executive vice-president of Ford's Premier Automotive Group, are two men charged with bringing emission-free motoring to the masses.
Hancock is tasked with deciding what "green" technologies the world's biggest car manufacturer, GM, will develop over the coming decades. Getting the decision wrong would spell disaster, which is why GM and Ford have both spread their bets and opted to develop several cleaner power systems in parallel.
Both companies agree that hydrogen is the key fuel. But despite BMW and Ford both producing hydrogen vehicles that are in use, the technology to manufacture affordable hydrogen cars and the development of a network of hydrogen filling stations is still decades away.
This means manufacturers must come up with alternatives to bridge the gap between polluting fossil fuel-burning internal combustion engines and the hydrogen-powered cars, which emit nothing but water vapour, that we will be driving in 2050.
In the short term, Ford's answer is bio-fuel. "We are on a journey from 160g [of CO2 per kilometre] down to 120g in 2012 and we have to carry on going down," says Booth. "In the near-term, bio-ethanol does improve CO2 emissions on a well-to-wheel basis. And it is achieved at a low cost to the customer. But bio-ethanol is not part of the long-term solution, certainly not in Europe and North America where there is not enough land or CO2 benefit to make it long-term."
GM is heading in the same direction - along with Ford and DaimlerChrysler it has committed to half of its new US vehicles being bio-fuel-capable by 2012, and it is already producing 400,000 such vehicles a year, which is some 10 per cent of its total production.
But there is not agreement on how significant a long-term solution bio-fuels can be. Ford believes that in the medium to long-term there is not enough land to produce the raw material used to make bio-fuels such as ethanol. GM disagrees. "This issue of energy independence and diversity is extremely important, especially to the US and probably to every free nation," says Hancock. "In North America and Canada we have the ability to have a large supply of the feedstocks that go into making ethanol . . . there is plenty of capacity."
Both in the short-term at least are committed to the bio-fuel route. Ford was the first manufacturer to launch bio-fuel cars in Ireland, and now offers such models in both the Volvo and Ford marque ranges.
But it will not be just bio-fuels we will be driving over the coming decade. Diesel cars will become significantly more expensive following the introduction of stringent Euro 5 and 6 regulations, so petrol engines will regain popularity. "We think that within five years from now, advanced petrol engines will account for one-third of all European sales," predicts Booth, saying less advanced petrol engines will account for another third, leaving diesels with just one-third of sales in Europe by 2012. Currently they account for half of all sales.
BECAUSE DIESEL engines will cost so much to produce in order to meet the Euro 6 regulations, which comes into force in five to seven years, most manufacturers are investigating advanced petrol engine technology.
"We are continuing to look at turbo-charging and downsizing of our gasoline engines," Hancock explains, revealing how manufacturers are modifying current engine technology to reduce emissions and yet give the power motorists expect.
But it is hybrid technology that has been the headline grabber and has thrown Toyota to the forefront of "green" motoring in Europe.
This doesn't faze GM: "The European market doesn't seem to be as interested in hybrid as the North American market," says Hancock. "In the US market, the demand is already there and we have the largest wave of hybrid launches anywhere in the world at the moment . . . But only for the US market."
Ford is committed to a European hybrid offering, but it will not arrive for at least two years, says Booth, who has little time for some hybrids already on the market. "Iconic solutions do not address the overall CO2 problem," he says. "A few expensive hybrid cars with limited customer uptake concentrated in major metropolitan areas is, quite frankly, no answer at all . . . Our aim is to bring environmental motoring to the mainstream."
While Europeans may not yet adopt hybrids in any significant numbers, we will still be using the technology. "Rather than full hybrids in Europe, we expect to see the adoption of component parts of hybrid technologies such as stop/start systems and regenerative braking," says Booth.
The growing expense of producing diesel engines also spells doom for the possibility of a diesel hybrid car, despite the obvious environmental benefits of such a combination.
So it is advanced small-capacity, turbo-charged petrol engines, hybrid petrol cars and bio-fuel powered vehicles that we will be driving for the next 10 to 20 years. But what about in 50 years?
"GM's opinion is that hydrogen is the only way to completely remove the automobile from the emission equation," says Hancock, echoing the opinion of the entire motor industry. "Hydrogen is fundamentally a good, clean fuel. The only emission from a fuel cell is water," he says, revealing that GM's plan is to demonstrate a high volume hydrogen vehicle that is commercially comparable to conventional technology within three years.
"That doesn't mean that we would be in production necessarily, but it means that we could demonstrate the technology."
The chairman of Ford of Europe says there are more issues than just technical ones to resolve before hydrogen is commonplace. "Unless we have very low CO2 power generation - nuclear, wind or hydro - hydrogen is not CO2 -free because of the power needed to make it. So hydrogen is a part of the solution but it is a long, long way out," says Booth.
Both men are clearly passionate about producing vehicles that reduce the 10 per cent of the world's man-made CO2 emissions that cars and trucks emit every day. So they obviously drive fuel-efficient vehicles? "I drive a GMC Yukon Denali, it is a large sport utility vehicle," admits Hancock. The Denali is a 2.5-ton, all-wheel drive SUV powered by a 6.2-litre V8 petrol engine. It manages 13mpg.
"I drive a lot. I carry a lot of things." Booth, Ford's top man in Europe, says: "In our view, global warming is one of the biggest challenges facing the planet. It is essential for our future that we stabilise CO2 levels." And he drives? "I drive an XK Convertible," he admits. "But I do walk to work."